Saturday, 31 July 2010

Time for a random quote from a random publication. Why? I don't need a reason. This is my blog and I'll do what I damn well like. I suppose it fits somewhere in my occasional series on British Lager. If you want to go all anal.

"ADULTERATED LAGER BEER

Vendors of lager beer should beware to secure themselves against dangers like the following:—At Barton Police-court, on the 2nd inst., William H. Ravenscroft, commercial traveller, and John Fearn, were charged with selling lager beer which was not of the quality demanded by the purchaser, and which contained salicylic acid, injurious to health. Mr. W. A. Willcock, of Wolverhampton, prosecuted ; and Mr. Stone (Derby) represented Mr. Ravenscroft. Mr. Jones, County Analyst, showed that the acid was injurious to health when taken with food, because it impeded the process of digestion. Ravenscroft was fined 20s. and 11s. costs in each of two cases, and £5 and costs in a third case. It was thought that Mr. Fearn was a victim, and he was ordered to pay the costs, 11s. 6d.

We have repeatedly pointed out how objectionable the admixture of powerful drugs, such as salicylic acid is in articles of food or drink. In this instance the percentage was enormous, being no less, we understand than 14 grains per gallon. Publicans who unwittingly or otherwise sell lager beer so heavily dosed with dangerous drugs, as appears to be the case in the present instance, run grave risks, and they would do well to obtain a warrant for the lager beers they use that they are free from preservatives. So far as we are aware, this is the first case in which a prosecution has been successfully sustained for the admixture of preservatives to food stuffs. The question cf the repression of this practice is one, however, that has for a considerable time engaged the attention of the medical profession and those concerned with the enforcement of the Food and Drugs Acts, and now that a conviction has been obtained, and magistrates hold the admixture of these powerful drugs to be adulteration, publicans should take care that they are not made the victims of the brewers and dealers using such chemicals."
"Food & Sanitation, Volume 4", 1894, page 43.

Food and Sanitation. It sounds like one of the magazines they include for a laugh in Have I Got News for You. Actually, it's much scarier. It's enough to put you off ever shopping in the 19th century again. Those rascally shopkeepers and publicans. And all the muck they put into food and drink. Almost enough to scare you off the beer. Almost.

These old German recipes are so much fun, I'm posting another today. For one of my old favourites: Gose.

OK, I realise it isn't technically an extinct style. But it fits in nicely with the Kotbusser and Broyhan, so here it is.

"Brewing Gose according to Hermbstädt

This is what they call a Weißbier similar to Broyhahn, which is particularly well-brewed in Goslar and which gets its name from a river of the same name, from whose water Gose is brewed in Goslar.

For a brew of 2000 Berlin quarts [2,290 litres] is required:

1) 12 Berlin bushels (960 pounds) [480 kg] pale wheat malt.

2) 10 Berlin bushels (600 pounds) [300 kg] pale barley malt.

3) 5 pounds [2.5 kg] of the best hops.

The grist is doughed in with 2400 Berlin quarts [2,748 litres] of water at 36° R. [45º C], well worked out and then left to rest for an hour in a covered vessel. The second infusion takes place with the same amount of boiling hot water, being well mashed for 1 hour before the mash is to rest for one hour in a covered vessel. The wort is gently boiled until it has reduced to 2000 Quarts [2,290 litres], strained through straw, mixed with the hop extract and cooled in the coolship down to 14° R. [17.5º C].

The cooled, hopped wort is put into the fermentation vessel with 10 quarts [11.5 litres] of yeast, and when finally the resulting head of yeast has collapsed, the yeast on the top is removed, the fermented wort drawn into the storage barrels in the cellar, and like Broyhahn allowed to ferment out, during which the barrels must be well bunged. The hops are infused twice, the first time with 50 quarts [57 litres], the second time with 40 quarts [46 litres] of water, and finally squeezed. To use the spent grains for Kovent, they are immersed 1000 quarts of boiling hot water, the wort so obtained is boiled for half an hour with the pressed hops and finally pitched with 4 quarts of yeast.
"Grundsaetze der Bierbrauerei nach den neuesten technisch-chemischen
Entdeckungen" by Christian Heinrich Schmidt, 1853, pages 447-448.

I make that about a third of a pound of hops per imperial barrel. So pretty lightly hopped. No surprise there. Though they do seem to have forgotten about the salt and coriander. Bit odd, that.

As you can see, the gravities are very similar, starting in the low 1030's before the war and dropping to 1028 after 1942. Whitbread's Mild was tiny bit more heavily hopped, but scarcely enough to be significant.

The grists are quite different. Lees was much simpler: just pale malt, a touch of black malt, glucose and invert sugar. Until flaked barley and flaked oats appear in the later war years. Whitberad used more different types of malt, in particular crystal and MA malt. But the biggest differnce is the colour. Whitbread Mild was around 90 EBC, Lees just 29. So despite being broadly similar in terms of strength, thse two beers must have tasted and looked pretty different.